Select Orations of Cicero - Interlinear

by Thomas Clark

This Latin reader is an interlinear. The text is in Latin with a word by word translation in English beneath. The translation is quite literal and it will read very broken. The aim of interlinear translations was not to provide a smooth well-formed translation, but to serve as word by word aid to the reader.

Learners beware - in some circles Greek and Latin interlinears were frowned upon. The chief criticism was that interlinears did not promote well-formed, independent and meaningful translations. They were also seen as being too helpful for the lazy student. Still, interlinears did present an economic advantage in that they were both reader and translation in one book. It is worth noting that these criticisms were made mainly in the context of classroom use. For the modern independent learners interlinears may provide some utility, but they will prove to be unhelpful if the learner doesn't have a solid commitment to learning Latin syntax.

It is unclear to us at Textkit how wide-spread the use of interlinears were in the 19th century school room. But at the time of this book's publication in 1885, it's possible that the editors saw the winds of change. There is a brief section entitled, "Testimonials as to the Merits of the Interlinear Translation of the Classics". At approximately this same time in America many popular Latin textbooks and Latin readers which did not use the interlinear method were gaining in use, including Ginn and Company's "College Series of Latin Authors" and Macmillan's "Elementary Classics Series". These readers featured no translations and only line notes in the page footer or appendix. This method is still very popular today for readers intended for classroom use. By 1911, with the introduction of the Loeb Classical Library, readers in a new format with English on the opposing page had entered the market and still remain popular to this day.

This interlinear is presented for the curious and as a historical example of the transformation of Greek and Latin textbooks.
Please note: This 19 page download is only a small portion of a much larger 600 page book.

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